Success Leaves Clues with Robin Bailey and Al McDonald · 2026-04-30 · 32 min
What if the reason your company isn’t scaling… has nothing to do with your product, and everything to do with who you hire? In this episode of Success Leaves Clues, Robin Bailey and Al McDonald sit down with Alison Kaizer, Partner of Talent at Golden Ventures, to break down the real mechanics behind building high-performing teams inside early-stage startups. Alison has helped scale companies from dozens to hundreds of employees, and now supports founders across an entire portfolio, shaping the people decisions that determine whether a company grows or stalls. This conversation pulls back the curtain on what actually makes a great hire, why most founders get it wrong, and how to build a hiring system that works before your company even knows what it needs. From ditching resume bias to hiring for aptitude, from building structured interview systems to creating transparency in compensation, this episode is a masterclass in hiring as a strategic advantage. If you’re building a team, scaling a company, or making critical early hires, this episode will completely shift how you think about talent.
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